She still has the advantage in direct fundraising, according to new preprimary reports on Thursday night. In other key Democratic races, U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper also led his primary challenger, Julie Gonzales, and Manny Rutinel led the money race against Shannon Bird in the 8th Congressional District primary.

In DeGette’s race, three political groups that haven’t yet reported their donors reported spending a combined $1.2 million this month to support her or oppose Melat Kiros, an attorney who identifies as a democratic socialist, in the June 30 primary. Also running is University of Colorado Regent Wanda James.

Most of the reported outside money — $860,000 — was spent just since Tuesday on digital and TV ads.

Another outside committee called Justice Democrats, which supports progressive candidates and is mostly funded by small-dollar donations, has spent nearly $178,000 on mailers and digital ads to support Kiros or oppose DeGette. Kiros now also has the backing of U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, who announced his endorsement on Friday morning.

DeGette has represented the district, which primarily covers Denver, for nearly 30 years.

The largest outside contribution in the race has come from a political action committee called Pro-Choice Majority Action, which spent nearly $460,000 this week on TV ads supporting DeGette. The committee is affiliated with EDW Action Fund, which supports Democratic women running for Congress.

Another group that hasn’t reported its donors, named “Mile High Accountability Project,” spent $350,000 earlier this month on digital advertising to support DeGette.

And Project 218, a super PAC that supports Democratic candidates and hasn’t reported its donors since April, spent $400,000 this week on digital and TV ads opposing Kiros. The group by InfluenceWatch as a Democratic Party-aligned super PAC affiliated with . The PACs aim to help Democrats win back the House majority, including by defending incumbents in primaries.

A fourth group, the National Association of Realtors PAC, spent $11,041 this month in support of DeGette.

Colorado voter guide: Stories and explainers for the 2026 primary election

In the candidates' own fundraising, DeGette continued to outperform Kiros.

Since June 10, DeGette has filed 48-hour notices reporting $40,000 in additional contributions, required for donations of $1,000 or more close to an election.

Kiros raised $280,000 during the reporting period through June 10 and ended with $88,421 in her campaign account going into the final weeks. That was an improvement on her first-quarter report, which showed nearly $175,000 in contributions. Since June 10, she's filed 48-hour notices for $53,900 in additional contributions.

James, the third Democrat in the race, continued her last-place fundraising. She brought in just under $39,000 over the past two months. She ended the period with $25,800 in the bank. Since June 10, she's reported $2,500 in additional contributions.

The presumptive Republican nominee in the race, Christy Peterson, has not reported any fundraising.

Gonzales gains ground on Hickenlooper

In the U.S. Senate primary, Gonzales, a state senator, gained some ground on Hickenlooper but overall continued to lag behind his fundraising.

Hickenlooper reported raising nearly $900,000 between April 1 and June 10, including donations from individuals and PACs and transfers from joint fundraising committees. He spent nearly $2 million during that period as pro-Hickenlooper ads blanketed TV and social media, leaving him with about $3 million in cash on hand. Since June 10, he's disclosed another $52,200 in contributions in 48-hour reports.

Gonzales improved upon her contributions from the first quarter, raising $424,000 in the new report, up from $264,000 in the previous one. Her spending paled in comparison to Hickenlooper's, with $313,000 in expenditures during the 10-week period.

As of June 10, she had $226,000 in cash remaining. She's since reported $3,100 in additional contributions.

The winner of the primary will run against Republican state Sen. Mark Baisley.

Rutinel leads fundraising among CD8 Democrats

In Colorado’s most competitive congressional district, Rutinel continued his lead in fundraising in the Democratic primary against his Bird, his former colleague in the Colorado House. A third candidate in that race, Evan Munsing, dropped out of the race in May.

The 8th District primary has been the focus of the most intense outside spending in Colorado this year, with recent independent expenditures aimed at helping Rutinel bringing the primary total to nearly $7 million. The district includes north metro Denver suburbs and Greeley.

In direct fundraising, Rutinel raised $643,146 between April 1 and June 10. He entered the final weeks of the primary with $909,500 and has filed 48-hour reports for another $43,500 in donations.

Bird raised $421,000 in contributions in the most recent period, ending it with about $290,667 in the bank. She's since reported $25,500 in contributions through 48-hour notices.

Republican U.S. Rep. Gabe Evans, who currently holds the seat, has been amassing a multimillion-dollar war chest to take on whoever wins the primary.

The venue cancellations, at least two of them said to be based on security concerns with hosting the event featuring Hasan Piker, prompted outrage by the candidates. The episode also underlined broader questions as Democrats from different factions of the party debate whether figures like Piker draw in voters or risk alienating them.

Piker, a Twitch streamer who has 3 million followers on the video livestreaming platform, has tapped a young, anti-establishment audience that the Democratic Party has struggled to bring into its fold.

He’s also been the subject of sharp criticism from prominent political groups, including , for some of his most controversial comments. Those include a 2019 comment because of its foreign interventions and Piker saying he would “ every single time.” Piker has apologized for the comment about 9/11.

His provocative comments have made Piker a . But some Denver Democrats, including Melat Kiros, who is running in Colorado’s 1st Congressional District primary against U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, and state Sen. Julie Gonzales, who is running against U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper, have leaned into the figure’s sphere of influence. Both share progressive political views with Piker, and Kiros identifies as a democratic socialist.

“He has a large audience of really engaged voters,” said Annie Orloff, a spokesperson for Kiros’ campaign. “I think people like to throw a lot of shade at him, but he’s really supporting these candidates and helping them.”

Orloff said the two times have overlapped with some of the campaign’s best fundraising periods.

Gonzales, who wasn’t available for an interview for this story, to discuss her platform.

Both Kiros and Gonzales were set to campaign with Piker at a rally in Denver on Sunday. The event changed locations three times after venues canceled.

The original location, ReelWorks in the Five Points, canceled the event a week ahead of time after stating that its HVAC system wasn’t working, according to an email provided to The Denver Post. According to Kiros’ campaign, the venue hosted other events that same weekend.

A Reelworks representative didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Then a backup location, the Ogden Theatre on East Colfax Avenue, pulled out two days ahead of time, citing “significant pressure and concern from the local community.”

“This decision was made purely from a security viewpoint, there was no political viewpoint or political decision around it,” Dennis Dennehy, a spokesperson for theater operator AEG Presents, told The Post.

Organizers then turned to the Stanley Marketplace in Aurora. But it also canceled the event, citing security concerns related to Piker’s appearance, according to the Kiros campaign. The Stanley Marketplace didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Piker has spoken at Yale University and the University of Chicago. He was also set to speak at South by Southwest in London until he was banned from entering the country because officials believed his presence “may not be conducive to the public good,” .

After the Kiros campaign ultimately moved the event to the steps of the Colorado Capitol on Sunday, drawing hundreds of people, Piker and Gonzales both decided not to attend. Instead, during the event and later hosted Kiros and two candidates from other states who were in town for the event on his channel.

Kiros’ campaign alleged, without evidence, that DeGette had applied pressure to compel the venues to cancel the event.

“I think it is hard to make a distinction from the folks who fund people like Diana DeGette and the people who own these venues,” Orloff said.

AEG Presents is part of the Anschutz Entertainment Group, founded by Colorado billionaire Phil Anschutz, a Republican.

DeGette’s campaign denied the allegations, saying the claim was made up.

“I can’t believe I have to say this, but it’s an absolute lie that I or my campaign had anything to do with her venue cancellations,” DeGette said in a statement. “She’s free to make her own mistakes, and campaigning with an infamous anti-semite who says he ‘hates this country’ and thinks we ‘deserved 9/11’ is a big one.”

Democrats in other states who have appeared alongside Piker have seen a mix of harsh criticism and a boost of engagement with their campaigns.

Democratic left figures like New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders have also all appeared on his channel.

Other Democratic candidates — like Sen. Michael Bennet and Attorney General Phil Weiser, who are running for governor of Colorado — haven’t appeared on Piker’s channel. Colorado Democratic Party spokesperson Andrew Nicla said the party had no comment on candidates appearing on shows like Piker’s.

Colorado’s June 30 primary and other states’ party contests may serve as a litmus test of sorts for candidates who welcome that ideological corner of the internet.

When Politico reported that Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed was appearing alongside Piker in April, his opponents heaped criticism on him. But in recent polls, he in the three-way race.

Earlier this month, as primary election results rolled in, Piker celebrated the victory of a congressional candidate he had campaigned for in New Jersey, . But that same night, in California, three candidates whom Piker also supported lost their primary races.

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Platner is a political dumpster fire and the epitome of their moral hypocrisy.

Platner had a tattoo resembling the Nazi Totenkopf symbol, associated with the SS and concentration-camp guards during World War II, on his chest, which has been exacerbated by his rhetoric. He has also been tied to a long list of inflammatory Reddit posts and comments: remarks questioning why Black restaurant patrons tip less; comments interpreted as blaming sexual assault victims for drinking; attacks on rural white Americans as stupid; statements advocating political violence; calling all police officers bastards; and, even mocking a wounded Purple Heart recipient as someone who “didn’t deserve to live.”

Platner’s history shows a documented pattern of offensive and vulgar conduct.

Despite these concerns, Democrats looked the other way while jumping on the Platner bandwagon.

Why? Because Platner has been leading in the polls and offers the party a chance to beat Sen. Susan Collins and win control of the Senate. Collins has served in the Senate for 29 years and is one of the Republicans’ more moderate senators. Democratic Party leaders rationalized Platner’s history, dismissed it as old news, and insisted he was a changed man. The moral outrage was swept under the rug in the name of political power at any cost.

Then another bomb dropped. Platner recently exchanged sexually explicit text messages with multiple women shortly after getting married and during the early stages of his senate campaign.

Democrats would be incensed if the shoe were on the other foot and Platner was the Republican candidate. They would be on every talk show and flooding social media, arguing that he was unfit for office and demanding his immediate withdrawal from the race. Progressive activists’ talking points would call Platner a Nazi and brand him as the face of the Republican Party.

Despite these recent developments, Platner has continued to receive silence, excuses, and outright support from prominent Democrats. Key Democratic leaders like Senator Bernie Sanders, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Representative Ro Khanna, and other progressive figures .

Sen. Sanders has spent years arguing that character, rhetoric, and personal conduct matter when evaluating Republican candidates. From chastising President Trump, to calling on Roy Moore to step down during the Alabama Senate race, to criticizing figures such as Herschel Walker and George Santos, moral standards and decency used to matter to Sanders. Not so much, apparently, when the candidate has a “D” by his name and his opinions align with Sanders’ socialist views. Then, the interests of the working class somehow become a permission slip for a moral and political train wreck.

Democrats should demand that Platner step aside before the next bomb drops. Gov. Janet Mills, who recently suspended her campaign, should be the Democratic nominee in this critical race if there is to do so.

The larger issue goes far beyond Maine.

Democrats now have two dramatic examples of losing their voice when it matters. Consider their lost-in-the-wilderness posture toward President Joe Biden when it was clear he was not competent to run for re-election. They either defended Biden as fit or remained silent.  And, the lack of moral clarity was disturbing, particularly from Jill Biden, who now concedes she thought her husband was having a stroke during his disastrous debate performance.

Even more concerning is the direction of the party. Democrats constantly describe themselves as the party of the “big tent” — a coalition supposedly broad enough to welcome different viewpoints, backgrounds, and perspectives. Increasingly, however, that tent seems to have room for radicals and ideological extremists while pushing out Democrats who think independently.

Take Democratic Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman, for example. Fetterman is a progressive Democrat who has never abandoned Democratic priorities on issues such as labor, health care, and affordability. However, he refuses to march in lockstep with Democrats on every issue, particularly when it comes to Israel and public safety. His independent views on Israel have drawn not-so-friendly fire from the activist left. For that independence, he is increasingly treated as a disloyal outcast by members of his own party, who continue trying to push him out of the tent.

As my son Wes aptly said, the moral of the story is that some democrats seem okay with Nazi symbolism but not a Jewish state.

The modern Democratic “big tent” appears large enough to embrace candidates accused of extremism and deeply disturbing behavior, but not large enough to tolerate free thinkers willing to challenge progressive orthodoxy.

A party desperate for national leadership and a cohesive message that resonates with Americans cannot have it both ways. And, it can’t credibly cry moral outrage with Republican candidates and elected officials while accepting and explaining away the outrageous behavior and conduct of its own candidates.

Platner is a national stain on the Democratic Party in 2026, and Republicans will use him across the country as midterm fodder unless Democrats find their voice — and their standards — while there is still time.

Doug Friednash is a partner with the law firm Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Schreck, who grew up in Denver and writes occassional columns for The Denver Post.

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Melat Kiros — who’s also a lawyer and a Ph.D student when she isn’t behind the counter at the Whittier Cafe — is picking up momentum in her first-ever political campaign. She’s running against longtime U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette in the Democratic primary for Colorado’s 1st Congressional District in Denver.

DeGette, who was sworn into office the year Kiros was born, has .

But Kiros, a Democratic socialist, rose to prominence after she demolished DeGette in the Democrats’ Denver County assembly last month. And while political observers, including Kiros herself, say the assembly process isn’t actually representative of who will vote in the June primary, the win still marked a surprising development in a race that many considered to be predetermined.

“This has nothing to do with me and everything to do with the fact that Denver Democrats want a fighter — somebody who is actually committed to transformative change,” Kiros said in an interview this week with The Denver Post.

Kiros didn’t keep DeGette off the ballot, but she gave her a scare. Kiros won 646 votes, or the support of 63% of those present at the county assembly. DeGette won 336, or 32% of the votes.

It was the first time DeGette had lost a county assembly vote since she initially won her seat in Congress in the 1996 election.

Two weeks after the county assembly, DeGette, 68, narrowly won her place on the primary ballot at the 1st Congressional District party assembly, receiving 33% support — just above the 30% threshold to make the ballot. A third primary candidate, University of Colorado Regent Wanda James, , but her voter signatures are still under review by the state.

Denver-based state Rep. Javier Mabrey, who endorsed Kiros, said he saw her as part of a larger movement within the Democratic Party: voters who don’t want to see the same types of candidates elected.

Like New York City’s new Mayor Zohran Mamdani, Kiros is a more progressive Democrat than those who currently make up the majority of the party’s members in Congress, he said.

“I think there’s an energy for politics that says, ‘Our problems are more complicated than Donald Trump alone. We’ve got to confront the conditions that led to Donald Trump,” Mabrey said of the Republican president. “I think Melat has tapped into that.”

Kiros will still have a long way to go if she hopes to pull off a win of the June 30 primary, however. The assembly gathered only a tiny sliver of the 416,000 people eligible to vote in the June Democratic primary — 230,000 unaffiliated voters and 186,000 registered Democrats, as of March 1, according to the secretary of state’s office.

A spokesperson for DeGette’s campaign said the congresswoman was proud to have made the ballot through the assembly process.

“This is ultimately only a small first step with a small group of people,” Jennie Peek-Dunstone wrote in an email. “Now, we are talking with hundreds of thousands of Democrats and unaffiliated voters across the District. Diana has deep support across Denver because she’s always fought for us. She’ll keep championing our progressive values by standing up to Trump, fighting for universal health care, and defending our democracy — just as she always has.”

Denver is a Democratic stronghold, meaning that whoever wins the primary is all but guaranteed to win the general election. In 2024, DeGette defeated her Republican challenger with 77% of the vote.

Kiros’ background

A child of immigrants, Kiros was born in Ethiopia but moved to Denver with her family as a baby. She left the city to attend Washington College in Maryland and went on to attend law school at the University of Notre Dame. After passing the bar exam, she began work as a securities regulation attorney at , one of the biggest law firms in the country.

Kiros said that two years in, firm leaders fired her for a by Hamas in Israel, which responded by launching a war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. In the post, she questioned Israel’s legitimacy as a state and disavowed about the rise in antisemitism.

“This letter rightfully rebukes the anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, and bigotry of all kinds that has spiked in recent weeks, but then goes on (to my confusion) to cite ‘calls for the elimination of the Israeli state’ as anti-Semitism,” she wrote. “… To conflate such bigotry with the geo-political question of Israel’s legitimacy is one of the greatest travesties in this conflict.”

More recently, Kiros has been criticized for sharing last month with a video that said Democrats “fellate Israel” and “suck (expletive).” The video was promoting an online rally for progressive candidates and speakers.

Kiros said she didn’t write that phrasing and doesn’t endorse that language.

After her firing from the law firm, Kiros says she decided to get more involved in politics. Now, she’s pursuing a doctorate in public policy with a focus on “democracy reform” at .

In 2024, she volunteered as the communications director for Democrat John Padora’s campaign in Colorado’s 4th Congressional District — one of the most conservative seats in the state and now represented by U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert.

‘Our party isn’t fighting back’

Kiros’ online ads , calling out not only DeGette but also former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. One shows large Xs over photos of former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and former President Joe Biden while Kiros says: “We hear politicians say over and over that we need bold leadership, progress and change. We’ve heard this for years. Decades. But they never deliver.”

“Our party isn’t fighting back like they should,” she goes on to say.

Kiros is endorsed by the Denver chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America and the Justice Democrats. She says that if elected, she sees herself aligning with members of Congress like U.S. Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Summer Lee of Pennsylvania and Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.

She would use her position, she said, to “call out the Democrats who are not actually fighting for our values” and pressure them to change the votes she disagrees with. That could include civil protests and threatening quorum.

Her top three policy priorities would be passing “Medicare for All” and universal child care and creating a publicly financed election system similar to the one that Denver uses in city elections, which includes public matching for smaller-dollar donations.

DeGette supporters emphasize that the congresswoman is also a co-sponsor of Medicare for All legislation. Angie Anderson, a Platt Park resident and mother of 2 young children, said she’s heard DeGette talk about it.

“I consider myself pretty progressive, and I think that she represents me very well,” said Anderson, who said she has voted for DeGette in every election since she’s lived in Denver.

Ocasio-Cortez even gave DeGette a shout-out for her support of the policy .

“She is one of the most powerful people in Congress on health care,” Ocasio-Cortez said to the crowd of 30,000 people. “And Diana DeGette is a co-sponsor of Medicare for All. She believes in the guaranteed right to health care for every American. Thank you for electing her.”

Anderson said she thinks Kiros and DeGette are actually pretty similar politically.

“I just think the real difference is that Rep. DeGette has many years of experience and is actually a very skilled policymaker and legislator,” she said. “I take issue with the idea that youth and inexperience is fundamentally required to effect change.”

What did assembly win mean?

After Kiros’ assembly win, a wide swath of political observers jumped in to say that while the event’s outcome was surprising, it wasn’t particularly meaningful for the upcoming primary.

Doug Friednash, a former Denver city attorney and chief of staff to then-Gov. John Hickenlooper, wrote in a Post opinion piece recently that assemblies exclude the vast majority of voters, resulting in a “tiny, highly motivated slice of activists” to determine results.

“More and more extreme candidates in both parties have effectively used these caucuses to fly under the radar and effectively organized a small cadre of activists, like the Democratic Socialists, to show up at the caucus, leading to stunning results that make most voters shake their heads in extreme disbelief,” wrote Friednash, now a partner with Denver-based law firm Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber and Schreck.

At the very least, the win showed that Kiros’ team found a way to out-organize DeGette’s team. But it remains to be seen if that will continue through the primary election.

Kiros and her supporters agree that her assembly win doesn’t mean she’s a shoo-in to win the primary.

“I don’t think that folks who talk about the assembly not being reflective of the general electorate are wrong,” Kiros said. But she noted it was unusual for an incumbent to lose an assembly vote.

“DeGette has been challenged before,” Kiros said. “This is a different kind of campaign.”

Mabrey said finding ways to raise money for her campaign will be one of the keys for Kiros in the remaining months before the primary.

“Melat����ap going to need an injection of grassroots campaign cash to keep up,” he said.

Through the end of 2025, she had raised about $204,000 and spent nearly $138,000. DeGette had raised about $729,000 and spent $507,000 through then, while James had raised about $179,000 and spent $86,600.

Despite having lower cash reserves than DeGette, Kiros is getting recognized more often when in public, she said. During a recent hourlong interview with The Post at a Capitol Hill coffee shop, two people stopped by the table to introduce themselves and voice their support for her.

“I’m totally voting for you, dude,” one said. “Your campaign is (expletive) awesome.”

Between now and June, Kiros plans to knock on doors, call voters, work with businesses and use digital advertising to get her message out. Nearly 200 people volunteered at a recent weekend canvassing event, she said.

“The thing that we need to do to win,” she said, “is to give people enough faith that getting involved will make a difference.”

Staff writer Seth Klamann contributed to this story.

“When you take a look at what����ap happening right now in America, it����ap pretty dismal,” said James, a Democrat, in an interview. “And we are lacking leadership in America.”

James’ effort to beat Democratic U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette in the Denver-based 1st Congressional District comes nearly three years after James was elected to CU’s governing board. An early marijuana entrepreneur who opened a cannabis shop in northwest Denver, she sought to frame her primary challenge within larger debates consuming the Democratic Party.

Namely: how to respond to the Trump administration and growing frustration among Democratic voters with the party’s leadership.

“When I look at what����ap happening here in Denver, Denver is a very, very different city. The 1st Congressional District is a different place than it was 30 years ago, even 10 years ago,” she said. That’s a reference to 1996, when DeGette, now 68, was first elected.

James’ congressional campaign is part of seeking to unseat established Democratic politicians in the 2026 midterms. Indeed, James’ comment about the length of DeGette’s tenure echoes what U.S. Rep. Nancy Pelosi’s primary opponent said earlier this year: “We are living in a totally different America than the one (Pelosi) knew when she entered politics 45 years ago.”

Alongside James, four other Democrats have filed to challenge DeGette in next year’s primary. They include in their late-20s — Melat Kiros and Carter Hanson — who’ve also noted DeGette’s lengthy tenure in Congress, according to Westword.

James, a 61-year-old Navy veteran who’s also worked as a political strategist, is the only one currently serving in elected office.

James said that if she wins, she will support a “Medicare For All” program, which would ensure health care coverage for all Americans, and an income-based version of to provide free tuition to public four-year universities. She said she will also back policies to boost homeownership in Denver, .

She said she supports immigration reform that would provide a path to citizenship for people brought to the United States as children, along with farmworkers and That plan would include more border security — on immigration policy.

She said her priorities include trying to repair the Democratic Party’s brand, which has for a path forward after President Donald Trump’s election last year. She cast that effort as centered around fighting broadly against Trump policies, including the administration’s mass-deportation agenda.

James, who represents the 1st Congressional District’s residents on CU’s governing board, was the first black woman elected to the panel in decades.

This year, she has faced controversy in that position. She was censured by the board earlier this summer after she was accused of trying to strip funding for a CU campaign that sought to provide information about the risks of high-potency marijuana. One member of the board accused her of putting her own interests as a marijuana business owner over the interests of the university.

James has said the campaign’s materials were racist — they included images of a Black family suffering from a mother’s marijuana use — and she said the censure was about “censorship and retaliation.”

The new wave of challenges against incumbent Democrats has only just lapped the shores of Colorado’s blue strongholds, where two longtime Democratic officials are vying to succeed Gov. Jared Polis next year and U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper, who is up for reelection, boasts and faces only newcomer primary challengers so far.

Still, DeGette has parried aggressive primary challenges before in the 1st District, which is now largely contiguous with Denver city boundaries and also includes Glendale and Holly Hills.

Her 2018 Democratic opponent initially raised more money than the congresswoman, sparking early murmurings that DeGette may be vulnerable. But she cruised to a in the primary and has not drawn a substantive Democratic opponent since.

She enters this campaign season with more than $320,000 in the bank, .

Last summer, DeGette defended then-President Joe Biden’s brief determination to stay in the presidential race. In a virtual town hall earlier this summer, she sharply criticized Trump’s policies and the federal tax bill that later blew a hole in Colorado’s budget. She also said she supported ending U.S. funding of offensive weapons for Israel.

In a statement Wednesday, DeGette spokeswoman Jennie Peek-Dunstone said the congresswoman had fought to “stop the harmful cuts to Medicaid, defend reproductive freedom, lower the cost of medicine, and boost breakthrough lifesaving medical research.”

“In these uncertain times when extreme MAGA Republicans control the White House and Congress, we need Congresswoman DeGette’s proven leadership to hold the Trump administration accountable and continue delivering for Denverites,” Peek-Dunstone said.

But James expressed confidence, saying she had the name recognition and fundraising abilities to beat DeGette.

“This is the first time in Diana’s 30-year career that she’s going to be facing a challenger that can bring all of that to the forefront,” she said.

For David Seligman, that focus would be a continuation of what he called his “life’s work.” A Harvard Law grad, Seligman since 2018 has led the Denver-based nonprofit Towards Justice, which has backed litigation and legislation to support ride-hailing app drivers, renters, migrant workers and meatpackers.

“I’ve seen throughout my career that there are two sets of law in this country,” he said in an interview. “There’s one for those with wealth and power, and one for the rest of us. Especially as the Trump administration is dismantling … the parts of the government that are there to protect workers, consumers, small businesses and the environment, it’s critical right now that we make sure those with wealth and power play by the same set of rules as the rest of us.”

Seligman enters an increasingly crowded 2026 Democratic primary field to succeed term-limited Attorney General Phil Weiser. Secretary of State Jena Griswold is an immediate front-runner, but other candidates include Boulder District Attorney Michael Dougherty and former state House Speaker Crisanta Duran.

He said he wants to build upon and expand the work of Weiser, who is running for governor. Weiser has filed or joined lawsuit after lawsuit against the Trump administration since January. Before that, his office had pursued consumer-protection investigations and lawsuits — some of which Seligman’s firm was involved in — against landlords and companies like Wyatt’s Towing.

Seligman said he would continue that work while focusing on medical debt, corporate price gouging and responding to the the federal government’s withdrawal from regulatory oversight.

Against the longstanding political figures in the AG’s race, Seligman — who’s never run for office — stands as a relative unknown among the broader voting public. His early challenge will be elevating his message and finding a constituency in a crowded political environment and in a Democratic Party still searching for a path forward.

Seligman’s charted path will likely be the most liberal of the AG field. He spoke at U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders’ Greeley rally earlier this year, and he joins the race with endorsements from most of the progressive lawmakers in the state Capitol. That includes the state House’s third-ranking Democrat, Rep. Jennifer Bacon, along with former state Democratic Party chairwoman Morgan Carroll.

“Right now, people know that the world feels deeply unfair and deeply scary,” Seligman said. “And I want to fight to be their lawyer to make sure the law is on their side — and not on the side of billionaires and corrupt politicians.”

It continues to alarm me that opponents of the Worker Protection Act  (that would overturn the Labor Peace Act) use the union shop argument as a false defense of workers’ rights. Compelling union membership vs. open shop contracts is an important discussion, but the existing Colorado Labor Peace Act is designed to stop union organizing and nothing more.  They are fully aware of this because they are the same people who oppose open-shop unions as well.

The Labor Peace Act curtails freedom of association for thousands of people who want to improve their lives. It is not just about money. The right to organize is about public safety, work schedules and appeal rights. In short, it is about due process of law. People who truly believe in freedom of speech and association could modify this bill to mandate strong open-shop contacts, but they choose to label anything they disagree with as extreme or overregulation — especially labor law, considered by many as “anti-business” which is a death knell that has helped turn the two-party system into a smoldering mess.

Looking at the big picture, I think the fedearl DOGE and the Colorado Labor Peace Act resemble a perfect recipe for escalating class warfare. Colorado is a blue state. I hope Gov. Jared Polis listens to Sen. Bernie Sanders on this one (but not on everything).

Tim Allport, Arvada

Please stop the whining

That ubiquitous sound coming to your neighborhood soon is not from beautiful songbirds or children’s distant voices on the playground. No, it����ap the piercing whine of the annoying gas leaf blower.

Their use, especially by lawn service companies, seems to be growing by the yard. Is it really necessary to move every grass clipping and every dry leaf off your hardscapes? This noise pollution interrupts our relaxing moments, cozy chats and the peace we all deserve.

The noise level of a gas leaf blower with its two-stroke engine can reach up to 100 decibels. So, if you have to blow, choose battery-powered over gas-powered. Or just get out the broom!

T. Allen, Littleton

Medical debt should remain off credit reports

Re: “Lawmakers urged to increase consumer protection,” March 20 news story

The former general counsel for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) recently briefed Colorado’s Judiciary committees.

One CFPB action that our congressional delegation should work to protect is the rule that prohibits credit reporting companies like Equifax, TransUnion, and Experian from sharing medical debt information with lenders, which then gets used in calculating credit scores.

Medical debt is not like other kinds of consumer debt and should be treated differently.

Often medical debt is unavoidable — people get sick and suddenly face large medical bills, which can take months to pay off. However, if they can’t pay it off within 90 days of receiving the medical bill, their credit score gets dinged.

Even worse, medical bills sometimes have errors, which take time to fight. Complaints from people about debt collection attempts on medical bills that were not owed . People shouldn’t feel pressured to pay a bill they don’t owe just to protect their credit score.

Under the CFPB rule, people still owe legitimate medical bills. But that debt would not factor into their credit reports.

This is something the Colorado legislature has also tackled in a bipartisan fashion. Our federal representatives should protect the medical debt rule. Let’s let families recovering from health issues get back on their feet medically as well as financially.

Danny Katz, Denver

Editor’s note: Katz is executive Director at CoPIRG.

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Re: “It’s about ideology, not oligarchy,” March 30 commentary

Ross Douthat states that the misuse of “oligarchy” by Sen. Bernie Sanders creates a vision of Trumpism as a vision of billionaires calling the shots. He correctly notes that many Trump agenda items are not those of the oligarchs.

What he ignores is that any coherent “ideology” of Donald Trump is contained in Project 2025, which is his model for assuming power.

Project 2025 is explicitly derived from the processes used by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán to subvert his country’s democracy and by Russian leader Vladimir Putin to subvert the inchoate democratic movement after the fall of the Soviet Union. The oligarchs in Hungary and Russia support the dictatorship with their monetary gains in return for being allowed to remain billionaires. The dictator calls the shots.

According to former Secretary of Labor , seven oligarchs contributed a total of $1 billion to elect Trump and other Republicans. Elon Musk contributed millions to the key Wisconsin Supreme Court election. Musk, Jeff Bezos, Rupert Murdoch and Mark Zuckerberg support Trump on their mega-platforms.

Again, according to Reich, Trump supporters add to his riches through his . Douthat is right, except that the “ideology” of Trumpism should be called “kleptocracy.”

David Schroeder, Arvada

America is worth staying and fighting for

Re: ” ‘I don’t get why anyone would want to stay,’ ” March 9 news story

First, there was the article “I don’t understand why anyone would want to stay” about moving out of the U.S. because of the country’s political direction.

Then, there were the follow-up letters concerning the moves abroad – other countries are also having their problems, etc.

What amazes and distresses me is that I have seen no letters stating my instant, gut reaction when I read the “don’t understand why anyone would want to stay” article:

Because America is worth fighting for – for our future and the future country in which our grandchildren will live.

America has been a beacon of light to the world. That light is dimming. We need to stay and get that light shining again.

I never saw this country as a nation of quitters.

Alvina Mabry, Golden

The playbook to promote division

In what may be the lowest of lows in spreading inflammatory disinformation, Rep. Lauren Boebert, CD-4, issued a on April 1 in which she asserted that “Members of the Democrat [sic] Party have made calls for their supporters to incite and engage in domestic terrorism by attacking Tesla vehicles and facilities to protest Elon Musk.” This is utterly defamatory and beyond the bounds of civil political discourse, but it fits with the playbook of the Trump administration and Rep. Boebert’s efforts to create a false narrative promoting division and hostility within our society for their own political ends.

Ralph Roberts, Littleton

Journalist rightfully honored

I wish to offer my sincere congratulations to Sam Tabachnik for the honor of Journalist of the Year, Denver Post reporter, selected by the Colorado Society of Professional Journalists. He is an excellent researcher and writer. You must be very proud to have him on your staff. I anticipate reading his important articles in the Denver Post.

Victoria Swearingen, Denver

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Budget-writing lawmakers have spent the past several months finding more than $1 billion in cuts as they grapple with balancing the budget under the growth cap set by the Taxpayer’s Bill of Rights. The chair of the Joint Budget Committee, Sen. Jeff Bridges, characterized it as “a budget that everyone will be upset by and that everyone can be proud of” — foreshadowing what’s expected to be a lengthy debate about state priorities.

The Senate debate will be the first step toward the bill’s passage. It will then go to a full debate in the House, likely next week.

The budget for the 2025-26 fiscal year, which starts July 1, is one of the few must-pass bills every legislative session. Lawmakers budgeted to about $16.9 billion in general fund spending, which is the more flexible pot of money for state priorities. Overall spending would be $43.9 billion.

Here’s what else is happening in the legislature this week:

Single-payer health care analysis

Colorado’s latest push toward a single-payer health care system will be in the House Finance Committee on Monday afternoon. , if passed, would require to analyze model legislation creating a universal health care system in the state. The analysis would be paid for using gifts, grants and donations to the university.

The legislation already passed the Senate on a nearly party-line vote. Sen. Cleave Simpson, an Alamosa Republican, voted yes on the measure — in the hopes, he said, that it would finally silence the debate about whether Colorado should move toward such a system for health insurance.

Single-payer health care has otherwise been a priority for some Democrats and liberals for years and was a centerpiece of U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaigns. A similar bill died in the final hours of last year’s legislative session.

In 2016, Colorado voters rejected a universal health care proposal.

Age verification for websites

A bipartisan group of lawmakers is looking to regulate access to certain websites with a pair of bills slated for debate Tuesday.

The full Senate will discuss , which to access websites with porn and sexual materials. The proposal aims to protect minors, according to the legislative declaration.

Also that day, the House Health and Human Services Committee will debate , which aims to regulate social media use by youth. It would require platforms to determine if the users are children and provide extra tools so they can curate their experience on the platform. It follows a similar effort last year that failed in the final week of the session.

Committee hearings are the chance for public testimony on bills. The exact timing of the hearings and floor debates is fluid and can change.

“We will not allow America to become an oligarchy,” Sanders said to cheers. “This nation was built by working people, and we are not going to let a handful of billionaires run the government.”

Sanders, speaking alongside U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-New York, visited the city as part of a tour the pair are taking across the country  to garner early support for Democrats before the midterm elections in 2026.

“An extreme concentration of power and corruption is taking over this country like never before,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “A better world is possible.”

Ocasio-Cortez, who said the crowd was estimated to be 30,000 people, praised each of Colorado’s Democratic members of Congress while addressing the park.

“We need a Democratic Party that fights harder for us, too. That means communities choosing and voting for Democrats and elected officials who know how to stand for the working class,” she said. “Colorado, I want to thank you for working hard to make that happen.”

She also took the opportunity to call out Republican Rep. Gabe Evans, who narrowly defeated Democrat Yadira Caraveo in the November election to represent Colorado’s 8th Congressional District.

Ocasio-Cortez and Sanders have focused their visits on areas represented by Republicans but that have close enough margins to possibly swing toward Democrats in the future. Earlier in the day, the pair visited Evans’ district, for a rally in Greeley.

The district is likely to be a major fight as Democrats seek to regain footing in Congress. About 11,000 people attended the event, according to

In a news release Friday, Evans criticized Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez for their policies, including their lack of support for the oil and gas industry.

“Congressman Evans is fighting for lower costs, safer communities and making the American Dream possible for all Coloradans. His common-sense approach stands in stark contrast to AOC and Bernie Sanders’ extreme anti-oil-and-gas rhetoric,” according to the statement.

Bernie, who visited the same Denver park in 2019 when he was competing for the Democratic nomination for president, won that contest in Colorado in 2020 and 2016.

During Friday’s rally, he repeated themes he has long elevated around health care reform, support for Social Security and the power held by the wealthiest Americans.

“What I think is the worst addiction in this country, the most dangerous, is the greed of the oligarchs,” he said. “How much money do you need?”

Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez have visited several cities including Las Vegas and Omaha and will next go to Tucson.

Other speakers in Denver included union leaders and the former commissioner for the Federal Trade Commission, Alvaro Bedoya. President Donald Trump recently fired Bedoya from that position.

People watched from the rooftops of nearby buildings, the stairs of the Denver City and County building and outside of the gated perimeter of the official event. The rally remained peaceful, with crowd members occasionally chanting and shouting in agreement with the speakers. At various times, the crowd chanted Sanders’ and Ocasio-Cortez’s names and phrases such as “tax the rich.”

The speakers and crowd expressed frustrations not only with GOP members of Congress but also with Democrats. The crowd erupted in cheers when Jimmy Williams, general president of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, said he had a message for the Democratic Party: “Get off your ass.”